Following three hundred years of disunion and strife, Wendi, first Emperor of the House of Sui, has reunited the kingdoms of China. As a reminder of the glorious past, the Emperor has decreed that the capital of Chang-an -- ancient capital of the great Han Dynasty, but now ruined and overgrown -- is to be rebuilt. Architects have drawn up plans for a monumental Grand Pagoda. It is now up to you to see the plans to fruition.

In the countryside, tea plants can now be cultivated. The leaves of this marvelous plant, when carefully cured, make a delicious and aromatic drink. The popularity of -- and demand for -- this product is growing rapidly throughout the land, so ensure that adequate amounts are planted. Even the common folk, now residing in luxurious apartments, have acquired a taste for this savory beverage.

A wise sage relates that the revered Bodhidharma, a heroic Buddhist figure, can be of immense help where tea is concerned. It might therefore be wise to donate generous amounts of homage to him, as his presence could be especially useful for the fledgling tea industry.

In this first mission of the new dynasty, you have been charged in rebuilding the overgrown capital of Chang-an into a bustling city to showcase the power of the new Emperor.

These goals are very simple to reach. Despite the housing goal saying "or better", Luxurious Apartment is the highest level Common Housing available in the game. Providing Tea to these people is quite easy, though the new commodity should be grown primarily for export and to honour the requests. You will need to clear lots of the rubble to reach the rocks needed for the Feng Shui of certain buildings. Farms may be a difficult to place due to a lot of rocks, so you might need to irrigate your farms to improve them.

Don't forget that you need Hemp if you want to tax your people. As a minimum, place a Hemp Farm so you can provide some Paper to tax the citizens of this city. You can export large amounts of Silk to the trading cities available to you, as well as large quantities of tea. Kashgar will go through some turbulent times and will increase/decrease its trading quotas repeatedly throughout the mission.

The benefit of this mission is that you only need to keep one Ancestor Hero happy: tea and silk should be enough to get Shen Nong into the city, who can bless the Hemp Farms and boost production. Don't forget that tea will be needed for requests so you'll need a lot of farms if you want to spare some for the divine farmer.

Building the Grand Pagoda is simple. It requires no Labourer's, just a lot of resources, all of which are available on the map. While you wait to build the monument and reach the Heroes goal, build some forts in case people invade you due to no troops.

At some point during this mission, a city called Lhasa will be discovered. At this point, this city will do nothing, but pay close attention to them throughout the coming missions, as they will become important very soon...